DOGE Adrift: Muskrat’s Exit Exposes “Efficiency” Drive as Chaotic, Leaderless Disruption

Washington D.C. – Elroy Muskrat, the billionaire impresario tapped by President Felonious Punk to revolutionize federal bureaucracy, departed his role as the architect of the controversial Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) on Friday, May 30, 2025. His exit, however, far from signaling a potential course correction for an initiative already widely criticized for breeding chaos rather than competence, may instead be exposing DOGE for what many federal insiders and policy analysts have long suspected: a fundamentally flawed, ideologically driven project now left rudderless, thrashing in a sea of its own making, yet still angrily insisting on its mission to “reform” a government it seemingly despises.

The promise of DOGE was grand: a swift, decisive eradication of “waste, fraud, and abuse,” a trimming of bureaucratic fat, and the dawn of a new era of streamlined, cost-effective governance. Yet, the reality under Muskrat’s tenure, as meticulously documented by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP) and vividly illustrated by firsthand accounts from dozens of federal workers in a recent Washington Post exposé, was a Kafkaesque nightmare of new red tape, operational paralysis, and pervasive politicization.

Even with Muskrat at the helm, DOGE’s primary achievement appeared to be the creation of monumental inefficiency. The CBPP report cataloged systemic interference across the entire federal grants lifecycle. DOGE operatives seized control of the central Grants.gov portal, delaying or blocking vital funding opportunities, particularly those related to DEI, LGBTQ+ issues, or scientific research deemed “unpalatable” by the administration. The “Defend the Spend” initiative bogged down routine grant payments in new layers of review, creating financial crises for states, universities, and non-profits reliant on timely federal funds. Massive grant cancellations across a swath of agencies – from HHS and NIH to the EPA, Department of Education, and arts endowments – became commonplace, often justified by vague references to aligning with “administration priorities” or ending “politicized science.”

The Washington Post echoed these findings with on-the-ground reports of federal employees mired in absurdity: NASA engineers spending weeks justifying the purchase of simple bolts; State Department staff devoting days to vendor paperwork for previously routine embassy events due to new DEI certification hurdles (a requirement so unworkable it was reportedly rescinded for overseas staff only after a Post inquiry); FAA air traffic controllers struggling to get windows washed because of convoluted new payment systems; and NIH grants being screened by AI for an ever-shifting list of ideologically forbidden terms. The $1 federal credit card freeze, an early Muskrat gambit, continued to incapacitate basic agency functions.

Now, with Muskrat gone, the question looms: what becomes of this “efficiency” engine without its chief engineer? The troubling answer suggested by the administration’s own rhetoric is that the disruptive machinery will grind on, perhaps with even less coherence. White House spokesman Harrison Fields defiantly stated that “the work of DOGE will press forward unobstructed,” and that “anyone resistant to these critical reforms has had ample opportunity to step aside.” Similar sentiments were echoed by spokespeople at Interior and HHS, who insisted the administration is merely “replacing outdated, sluggish systems with streamlined, mission-driven operations” and will “never apologize for putting processes in place to ensure taxpayer dollars are used correctly.”

This is the language of an administration “angrily insisting” on its path, regardless of the evidence or the departure of its star reformer. It paints a picture of DOGE not as a strategic entity, but as a collection of embedded political loyalists and pre-programmed disruptive tactics now left to their own devices – the proverbial “fish out of water, floundering around not sure quite what to do, but angrily insisting that they have to do it.” The initiatives Muskrat set in motion – the grant reviews, the payment holds, the ideological screenings, the chaotic workforce reorganizations like the one that threw the Social Security Administration into disarray by forcing central office staff into frontline phone jobs under threat of firing – are likely to persist, driven by inertia and ideological zeal rather than any discernible, overarching strategy.

The forced reassignments at the SSA, for instance, have reportedly bogged down claims processing as experienced staff are diverted to train unprepared new arrivals, leading to more mistakes and greater backlogs – the antithesis of efficiency. The loss of in-house IT support at agencies like the Interior Department, a result of DOGE-led staff dismissals, has left employees waiting days for help with basic technical issues. Strict, inflexible return-to-office mandates and 9-to-5 “in your seat” rules are, according to federal workers, crushing morale and paradoxically reducing productivity, as staff can no longer flexibly manage their time or tasks like attending medical appointments without taking significant leave. “People are so demoralized, anxious, and sleep deprived,” a NASA employee told The Washington Post. “Nobody is working at top efficiency.”

Elaine Kamarck, a public administration expert at the Brookings Institution and a former Clinton official, had warned about the DOGE approach even before Muskrat’s exit: “What [Muskrat] showed is that you cannot do this without a plan, and if you do it without a plan that respects some of the functions of government that everybody wants, then what’s going to happen is you’ll end up making the government less efficient, and not more efficient.” Her words now seem prophetic. If the “plan” was largely embodied in Muskrat himself, what remains is an apparatus of disruption without a clear architect, yet still empowered by an unyielding White House.

The real cost of this ongoing “efficiency theater” is borne by the American public – in delayed research that could yield life-saving breakthroughs, in vital public health programs hamstrung by uncertain funding, in social services facing existential threats, and in the erosion of a competent, professional federal workforce. DOGE was presented as the cure for government bloat and waste. Instead, even under its high-profile leader, it often appeared to be the disease. Elroy Muskrat’s departure has simply pulled back the curtain further, revealing an “efficiency” drive that is not only failing but is now adrift, pursuing its counterproductive agenda with a leaderless, angry momentum that benefits no one but those who wish to see government itself falter. The promise was a well-oiled machine; the reality, now more than ever, looks like an engine of chaos.